Career guidance starts at home
Dec 15, 2009
YOUR PLATFORM<br>----------------------<br><br>Many students make career choices basing on what they are told at home than at school. Learners are inclined to their parents and relatives high profile career choices without due regard to their abilities
YOUR PLATFORM
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BY STEPHEN MBASANI
Many students make career choices basing on what they are told at home than at school. Learners are inclined to their parents and relatives high profile career choices without due regard to their abilities and changes in employment trends.
I appreciate the editors’ letter of November 25 that called for schools to have functional career departments. I wish to add that this should be done in time.
Offering career information to a Senior Six leaver is quite late, however up-to-date it may be. This is because at this stage, their career choices have been narrowed due to the subject choices they made earlier.
Career information should be part and parcel of Senior One orientation so that students are focused and in line with reality, or what President Museveni would call “right skills.â€
Career guidance should be multi-stake holder based, involving parents and teachers and both parties should engage each other. This helps to avoid conflict and sets the learner free from stress.
Parents have a crucial role to play because many students make subject and combination choices depending on their discussions with them.
- Establish the career dream of the child. What is it that the child envisages to be in future? This should form the basis of the guidance session. Remember, your role as a career guide is to help the child achieve his /her dream.
- Approach the guidance session with empathy. Empathising is “walking in another person’s shoes’’ to understand how that person feels.
- Passionately share feelings and knowledge about the child’s core career dreams. Just in case you are not knowledgeable about the basic requirements for that career, consult authentic sources like the
university prospectus.
- Be courteous and respect the child’s opinions. Even though you may disagree, take care to do so without being offensive. Remember the learner knows best his or her abilities.
- Use available source documents like report cards to give your opinions. This helps to put him or her in a true perspective basing on his or her potential.
- Offer possible alternatives and request learners to think about them as well. This broadens the learners’ mind to new and demand-driven career skills.
The writer is a senior teacher
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BY STEPHEN MBASANI
Many students make career choices basing on what they are told at home than at school. Learners are inclined to their parents and relatives high profile career choices without due regard to their abilities and changes in employment trends.
I appreciate the editors’ letter of November 25 that called for schools to have functional career departments. I wish to add that this should be done in time.
Offering career information to a Senior Six leaver is quite late, however up-to-date it may be. This is because at this stage, their career choices have been narrowed due to the subject choices they made earlier.
Career information should be part and parcel of Senior One orientation so that students are focused and in line with reality, or what President Museveni would call “right skills.â€
Career guidance should be multi-stake holder based, involving parents and teachers and both parties should engage each other. This helps to avoid conflict and sets the learner free from stress.
Parents have a crucial role to play because many students make subject and combination choices depending on their discussions with them.
- Establish the career dream of the child. What is it that the child envisages to be in future? This should form the basis of the guidance session. Remember, your role as a career guide is to help the child achieve his /her dream.
- Approach the guidance session with empathy. Empathising is “walking in another person’s shoes’’ to understand how that person feels.
- Passionately share feelings and knowledge about the child’s core career dreams. Just in case you are not knowledgeable about the basic requirements for that career, consult authentic sources like the
university prospectus.
- Be courteous and respect the child’s opinions. Even though you may disagree, take care to do so without being offensive. Remember the learner knows best his or her abilities.
- Use available source documents like report cards to give your opinions. This helps to put him or her in a true perspective basing on his or her potential.
- Offer possible alternatives and request learners to think about them as well. This broadens the learners’ mind to new and demand-driven career skills.
The writer is a senior teacher